


Lullaby

by Writing_Like_Ill_Die



Category: Dead by Daylight (Video Game)
Genre: Adopted Children, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Farm/Ranch, Childhood, Deal with a Devil, Domestic Bliss, Domestic Fluff, Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, Families of Choice, Family, Family Bonding, Family Dynamics, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Fluff, Gen, Homesteading, Kid Fic, One Shot Collection, POV Alternating, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, aged-down characters, fluff with a little plot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:55:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27374551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Writing_Like_Ill_Die/pseuds/Writing_Like_Ill_Die
Summary: Megan ‘Meg’ Nikolaev is a normal girl with too much energy for her tiny body. She lives in the woods, just outside town, and goes to school with her siblings, Claudette, Dwight, and Jake. Her mother is a wonderful woman who wears a veil outdoors, and is strong, mighty, and powerful. Her name is Anna, and she is Meg’s idol.People think her family is weird, especially her mother. They whisper about her tendency to wear a veil, about the difference in appearance of her children, of her clear accent and difficulty with words. Meg and her siblings defend their mother, of course.Luckily, there are other rumors that the folks of this tiny town like to talk about. Disappearances all over the world, both of random people but also of known criminals; murderers, maniacs, people who seem like they would come right out of a horror movie; all gone in a flash, with no trace left behind. Well... almost no trace left behind. At the site of each disappearance, they always find footprints of heavy gardening boots which lead to no where. Boots with soles that are designed like the paw prints of a hare.
Relationships: Anna | The Huntress & Claudette Morel, Anna | The Huntress & Dwight Fairfield, Anna | The Huntress & Jake Park, Anna | The Huntress & Meg Thomas
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Should I be starting a new long fic? No.  
> Am I gonna do it anyway? Yes.  
> Is this fic a coping mechanism? Maybe.
> 
> Feel free to suggest prompts or anything else for this AU!! I might write it if you do!!!

Megan ‘Meg’ Nikolaev is a normal little girl. She goes to school, has siblings, has hobbies and interests, and she has a loving mother. Meg is nine, almost ten, as she likes to remind everyone, and she’s full of energy. That excess energy used to be a problem, getting her into fights with the kids at school, but her mother stepped in.

Her mother is not exactly a normal mother. Anna Nikolaev, or Mama, as they all referred to her, lives in the woods, just outside town, and grows her own food, hunts for her own meat. She lives completely off the land, and is able to support four kids with the land’s gifts as well. She carves their toys, mends their clothes, feeds them their favorite meals, and teaches them ways to make the woods their playground. In this way, she was able to help Meg work off her excess energy by exploring the woods, climbing trees, jumping streams, and foraging for food. She taught Meg what to look for, what they could cook, what she could eat right out of the ground as a snack. And it worked.

The people in the village think that’s weird. They thought that Mama should have put Meg on pills, or disciplined her harder, or somehow forced her energy away. They thought it was weird that Mama harnessed it.

They thought it was weird that Mama lived off the land, though the more kind ones were impressed. The industrial, snooty ones turned their noses at Mama’s homemade preserves and foods. But the kinder ones, the kinder kids, thought it was amazing that Meg got to take her own woven lunchbox of deer jerky, pickled beets, and a little candied honey as a treat.

Those were the kids that the Nikolaev family usually made friends with. The kids that Meg made friends with. Because she adored the lifestyle her mother raised them in. While computers were cool, she knew nothing beat exploring the forest and seeing what you could find.

She loved her mother, in all her muscled, veiled glory. She loved living off the land. She knew her siblings felt the same. As much as chores were a pain, they all found something to love.

Jake was the oldest, at 11. He was also the only one who remembered any significant thing from his life before he was adopted by Mama. And what he remembered was pressure. Immense pressure. He was too young to really understand it, adopted at age 5, but he had especially taken to the homesteading life with vigor. He especially found a special love for animals, and happily helped take care of their chickens and sheep, all while hinting, though not very subtly, that they should get even more animals. In their spacious little cabin, Jake occupied a room on the top floor, facing east, where the sun rose through his window, and where he had built several perches and shelters for the crows he loved so dearly.

Meg, of course, was in love with foraging, but she also took to hunting like a fish to water. She learned to wield a bow and arrow, as opposed to her mother’s hatchets, and was respectful of the ‘no guns’ rule. Honestly, bows were more fun, and more rewarding. Nothing was more exciting than tracking down an animal and striking it down. Nothing was sweeter than fresh meat for dinner, and her mother’s praise. She and Jake were both eager to build, too. While Meg simply loved to do things with her hands, to be helpful, Jake liked the challenge of it.

Claudette was 8, and she was the sweetest person in the world, Meg was sure. She adored botany, and she was super good at it, too. She helped plant the garden and take care of it as well. From the day that Mama brought home a fancy botany kit from the city for her to experiment with, she was enamored with plants and all they brought with them. She studied all their garden plants intensely, playing with their genetics to alter flavor and texture, and also to find new ways to heal. Her healing salves were sometimes slimy, but very useful, especially out in the woods where rashes and minor injuries were near inevitable. And chigger bugs. Her salves were a godsend against chigger bites and preventing them. Not to mention that she was very good with the bees, a chore that only she and Mama herself could brace regularly.

Dwight was only 6, and he hadn’t yet figured out what he was good at yet. He was good at a lot of things, but none of them seemed to be his ‘thing.’ For now, he did a little of everything, but mostly helped his mother cook and clean the house. He seemed to understand math well, though, and was good st helping Mama come up with prices for her produce when they went into the city for farmers’ markets. Maybe when he got older, that would be his specialty. But for now, they were all happy with shy little Dwight, helping peddle goods and make meals.

They all had their interests and hobbies, and they were all happy with Mama. That’s what mattered.

—

Anna was a good mother, just like she wanted to be. She had the knowledge, the know-how, the ability to feed and groom and care for children. That was all she’d ever really wanted, ever since her mother died. But it came at a price, as most things did. She could love these kids, rear them, live a happy life, but only if she did as she must. As long as she filled her end of the bargain.

Late at night, long after the kids had gone to sleep, Anna shed her usual clothes for homesteading, shed her veil, and put on her overalls, shirt, mask, and her boots with rabbit footprints on the soles. Mama was a good mother. And to keep being a good mother, the Huntress needed to do what she did best.


	2. Hammer

The structure of their cabin was sturdy, as was the coop, the barn, and the greenhouse. It was all built with sturdy timber, with tough glass windows that Mama had laid herself from riverbank sand. The kids could rest assured that the house would stand through the harsh storms and the cold winter. She also had gas heaters and fans to keep the kids and the animals warm in the winter and cool in the summer.

But things still broke sometimes. It was just a hard truth of life. Mama did her best to repair things before they broke completely, but sometimes you just couldn’t catch a disaster before it happened. And sometimes there were outside forces involved.

Such as a storm ripping off part of the henhouse’s roof. Luckily they had herded all the animals into the storm shelter prior to the storm reaching them, so the chickens were unharmed. Rising out of their little in-ground shelter, Mama and the kids saw the gaping hole in the coop roof.

For a solid minute, they dimply stood in stunned silence.

“Good thing the chickens were inside.” Jake’s voice was shaking with shock and relief, betraying the calmness he was trying to give off.

The little family all nodded in silent agreement.

“...At least it wasn’t lightning.” Meg joked, trying to break the tension.

“Don’t jinx it!!” Dwight scolded.

Mama rumbled a deep laugh. “Lightning not something worry about, _zayats_. It like tall things, and we have tall trees all round.” She strutted to the coop to examine it further, taking long strides that her herd of children had to run to keep up with.

The roof was sloped, to let water run off it easier, and made of a layer of logs with thick tar holding them together, with a thick layer of dried grass and pine needles laying on top the roof, glued by more thick tar, to keep the wood from getting soggy and the tar from getting runny. It seemed a piece must have been weak, though, because a couple logs had split in half and soared off, taking their tar and covering with them, along with ripping the covering off their neighboring logs.

“Mm. I can fix. Maybe this time use nails, _da_?” She mumbled, mostly to herself. It was very rare that their mother would use modern tools for something, preferring to use the woods. However, she recognized the good in them, as most of her tools were ones she had bought and meticulously kept. She also recognized that more storms were likely to follow this one, and she needed the extra protection that nails might bring.

“I’ll go get your tools, Matushya.” Jake offered helpfully, running to her little shed.

“Be careful, _zaichik!_ Do not go basement!” Mama yelled after him. He gave a thumbs up as he kept running. She looked back at the henhouse. Somehow, the chicken wire fence still stood strong.

“Fence is not damage. Go ahead and bring chickens back, _moy zaytsy_. Mama will remove what cannot be salvage.”

“Yes _Matushka_!” Three little kids chorused, running obediently back to the storm shelter, where all the animals were still waiting. They descended the steep stairs, Meg pushing past to get there first. Always wanting to be the most helpful to Mama. Dwight was second, eager to be useful, but Claudette took her time down the tricky steps.

The chickens and sheep were all crowded in their little corners, but they were happy to see the kids back. Dwight, who the chickens loved nearly as much as they did Jake, was crowded by them. The three kids all carefully picked up a chicken, carrying them one by one back to the coop. The smarter, older hens were able to follow them up all by themselves, but the newly hatched ones couldn’t brave the stairs, and thus were the ones carried. The last to be carried was their single rooster, who was a bit of a coward. Jake had named him Ace. He didn’t know where the name came from, and their mother freezed upon hearing it, but it fit, and so Ace he was.

As they deposited the chickens into the coop, Jake had brought back the tools, and Mama had gotten to work laying the lumber for the roof. It slotted into the sturdy boards that made up the walls, and Mama was looking for nails long enough to connect the logs and the boards.

“Aha. _Zaytsy_ , come. I have lesson.” Mama told them, bringing out her hammer and some nails. The children gathered around, hopping up onto of the undamaged part of the roof to see better. “Nails come first. They sturdy. Always put most sturdy thing first.” She started to hammer the nails in with mighty swings of her arm. “When you older, you might have be help Mama do this, or do this yourself. You do not have now, but you should watch now. Learn.” She explained.

The kids, watching in awe, let out their own confirmations that they understood.

“But there is important thing. When you have dangerous tools like hammer, remember not let them control you. Remember that without hammer, you are still yourself. Still like others. And remember think of others. If you let hammer control you, everything become nail. In other word, if you let the hunt take you over, everything becomes prey. Do not let the hunt take over, _moy zaytys_.” Her voice had become progressively more somber during her speech, and the kids knew that this was a very special and rare reference.

Mama would sometimes reveal things about her past, but it was not a normal thing. It was only for very important things. She would not foreclose this information casually.

They could only wonder what had happened to Mama in the past that had made her so frightened of this idea of being more powerful than everything else. For some people, that was a dream. But maybe she achieved that dream, and discovered its horrifying realities. That kinda stuff was too complex for any of the four to understand, though. But they remembered the lesson carefully anyway, especially when they were working with living things. They didn’t quite get it, but they had the basic idea: Recognize the power that you hold over others, and don’t take advantage of it.


End file.
